Amazing Sports Romance!

Kandi Steiner gives us another amazing football story, building Zeke's team from Fair Catch. This one features Clay, the star player on the college team, willing to do whatever he needs to boost his team and give him the best shot at going pro. Always willing to give an interview, Giana, the team's public relations promoter, he was one she could count on. That is until he was dumped by his long term girlfriend, Maliyah. Giana has eyes for Shawn, a musician Giana follows, but her shyness keeps her on the sidelines. When going to get a statement from Clay after a game, he walks away, giving her attitude. To save face, she strikes a deal with him to be his fake girlfriend, making Maliyah jealous and Shawn take notice. But will the plan work? Fun! Fun! Fun! These two have incredible chemistry from the start, and hoped they would see the error of their ways as they pursue different relationships. Clay has some issues, but he is a good man, focused, sweet, attentive and romantic! Giana is quirky, and I love her! She is true to herself, knows what she wants, and goes for it! There is a little angst, a few twists and turns and a budding romance that made me fall in love! Plus Zeke and Riley are back and it's fun to get to see them as they too are enjoying their journey. Good friends to have, they help this couple find their happiness. Another winner by Kandi Steiner!

Edward Black and Miranda Dyer are both new to me, and they are wonderful together in this sports romance. Black is tuned into Clay's mind, giving us all the frustrations he felt, the deception and anger as well as the love. Dyer brings out all of Giana's quirks, and she is amazing at it! Giving her that one of a kind feeling, she wears her heart on her sleeve and we feel all of her emotions. It's a great pairing for this story and very enjoyable!

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Terrific Story & Listen🎧 Engaging & Entertaining!

Kandi Steiner pens another fantastic sports romance novel, and she puts her own unique take on the “fake relationship” and “opposites attract” trope. The story drew me in right from the start, not only grabbing and then captivating my attention but it tugged on my heartstrings throughout the entire book as well. I adored the two lead characters, Clay Johnson and Giana Jones, both are college students, he is the star football player with dreams of going pro one day and she is an assistant public relations coordinator for the team. He was one of the easier going players on the team, but he wound up giving her attitude and was rude to the reporters. She finds out the reason for his mood, his childhood girlfriend, Maliyah Vail, broke up with him and this was after she followed him to North Boston University. Giana is crushing on Shawn Stetson, a musician, and Clay picks up on this during a meeting with her and Shawn is performing on stage. So he has a proposition for her, that she date him, to make his ex jealous and then want him back, and he would help her get Shawn. She agreed with this plan and everything goes well. The two put a show on for everyone to see that they are romantically involved. A friendship grows between them and when she confesses her lack of experience with boyfriends, he volunteers to help her with that too and their plan works very well for them until it doesn’t. I loved the layers to the story and the complexity of the characters, also loved how it all played out for them. This wonderfully plotted story has plenty of drama, heartfelt emotions, a touch of angst and some steamy romance. Kandi Steiner, thank you for another great story and emotional rollercoaster ride.

🎧📚🎧 I listened to the audiobook edition, and this is my first time listening to these two narrators, Edward Black and Miranda Dyer. I thought they did a great job bringing the characters and their story to life. They had a complete understanding of the characters they were portraying, gave each a voice that suited that character’s persona and was believable in every role they played. There were some minor sound quality issues on Miranda Dyer’s end, but I am sure she will improve with more experience or get software to help clean up the background noise. Edward Black’s recording was perfectly fine, and he nailed it as Clay Johnson, as was Dyer’s Giana Jones. Both were great covering the roles of the secondary characters as well. They set the perfect tone for the story and captured all the character’s emotions and projected them into their performance. Thank you for the great listen.

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Can't wait to listen to the next book❤️‍🔥

𝔹𝕝𝕚𝕟𝕕 𝕊𝕚𝕕𝕖: 𝔸 𝔽𝕒𝕜𝕖 𝔻𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕊𝕡𝕠𝕣𝕥𝕤 ℝ𝕠𝕞𝕒𝕟𝕔𝕖 (ℝ𝕖𝕕 ℤ𝕠𝕟𝕖 ℝ𝕚𝕧𝕒𝕝𝕤 #𝟚) - 𝕂𝕒𝕟𝕕𝕚 𝕊𝕥𝕖𝕚𝕟𝕖

Each book is about a different couple and is considered a stand-alone, but I highly recommend reading all the books in the series
Because you definitely don't want to miss any book ❤️
This book focuses on Clay Johnson and Giana Jones.

“ᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇ ɢɪʀʟꜱ ᴡʜᴏ ꜱᴇᴇ ᴛʜᴇ ʙᴏx ꜱᴏᴄɪᴇᴛʏ ʜᴀꜱ ᴘʟᴀᴄᴇᴅ ᴛʜᴇᴍ ɪɴ ᴀɴᴅ ᴛʜᴇɴ ᴡᴏʀᴋ ᴍᴇʀᴄɪʟᴇꜱꜱʟʏ ᴛᴏ ᴛᴇᴀʀ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴍᴏᴛʜᴇʀꜰᴜᴄᴋᴇʀ ᴛᴏ ᴘɪᴇᴄᴇꜱ — ᴛʜɪꜱ ᴏɴᴇ’ꜱ ꜰᴏʀ ʏᴏᴜ.”

Every dedication brings a smile to my face.🥰

Clay is another player on the football team that we met in the previous book (Fair Catch), he was head over heels in love with his girlfriend. But this book opens with Clay being single.😧 After a not at all understandable breakup he's angry, hurt and becomes a serious pain in the ass for the all team with his behavior.

Giana is a reporter who interviews and is in charge of PR for her high school team, she is admittedly shy but when she gets into "work" zone she is super serious and filled with amazing and inspiring confidence.

In one of Giana's interviews with Clay they get off topic when he reveals that she has a crush on an artist from their high school.
Clay makes a deal with Giana - he will help her get the guy and in return she will help him get his ex jealous and run back to him.

I love Giana's character!!! I felt like I could totally identify with her because she reads the same genre as we do! I wanted to enter the book just to be her best friend❤️
She won my heart page after page, with her courage, depth and huge heart.
And Clay... oh man, why do I have a feeling that I will fall in love with all the guys on this team? He surprised me in many ways in the book.
And the amount of quotes I highlighted!!! - sweet romantic moments, moments that made me laugh so hard, hot and spicy part and so much more❤️

In my eyes, this book is so much better than the first book (and I'll tell you a secret🤫 - in my eyes, every book in this series surpasses the previous one, that's the superpower of this author❤️‍🔥)

Highly recommend it ❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥
5🌟

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Loved it

This fake dating, sports romance had me hooked from start to finish. I loved Clay and Giana and I enjoyed seeing how their fake relationship evolved into something real. These two had excellent chemistry and their steamy scenes were scorching hott. Additionally I loved the secondary characters who provided great support and balance. This was a fantastic read and I would highly recommend it to lovers of sports romance.
I lostened to the audiobook version and the narrators did a fabulous job with the story, giving each character their own voice and emotions. Their voices were clear and understandable and it was a pleasure listening to them narrate this novel.

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Steamy but still full of story!

I love a fake relationship story, and the fact the steaminess of the content doesn’t take away from the story is great! Read too many books that focus on the sex and not the story so I’m glad this was a fleshed out book!

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Fake dating perfection!!!

The narrators absolutely steal the show and although past reviews say there are issues, they have all been fixed and this audiobook takes this book to the next level!

This audiobook blew me away. Kandi has completely outdone herself and I think Clay just became one of my favourite Kandi men because just wow! Not only do we get the Kandi angst that I absolutely love in this book, but the spice! My oh my, this might be her steamiest book yet and I was here for it all! Beyond that, fake dating has become one of my go to tropes and this one was pure perfection. I loved Clay and Giana together, their connection was so natural and addicting. I lived for any scene they had together. Their story will completely enthrall you and have you staying up all night to finish it. Everything Kandi writes is gold, but this one has just stolen my heart. This series is *chef's kiss* and I'm loving every second of it!

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Just what I needed

After all the really dark romances I love I needed something sweet . Clay and Gianna went into a fake relationship to make the others they both wanted jealous . However from their first kiss they both know it’s something more than fake but they are both to stubborn to admit to each other. Things don’t go smoothly for them both there are others out to destroy them but in the end they get their HEA .

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Fake relationship at it's finest! Loved it.

Another amazing book by Kandi Steiner. I absolutely adored this book. Clay is everything! I was not expecting him to be so sweet & caring. Everyone needs a Clay in their life. Loved Gianna’s take charge spirit. These 2 together where hot, hot, hot! Excellent narration by Edward Black & Miranda Dyer (new to me narrator).

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Deliciously dirty NA romance with great narration

Well, these are two new narrators to me and they both smashed it. I love a good sports romance and even though I’ve never watched American Football (and yes, I call it American football because I’m not American and football is a totally different game, but I digress) I was able to get into this, and Kandi had me hooked from start to finish. Famous for her angst she definitely gives this couple more than the regular one-big-thing to get over and I was here for it. I love when one or both parties have to work to get back into the other’s heart and these guys certainly had to. Kandi not only gave them hurdles but Clay has a past that just made me want to cuddle him, so once again she’s written characters that you’ll fall in love with.

This is an NA, uni, fake-dating romance with a few lessons in seduction thrown in that are nice and spicy. Giana has a major crush on Sean, and Clay convinces her to fake date him to get back at his ex and she gets schooled in how to catch Sean’s attention. There are a bunch of PDAs that stir up something inside both of them and I loved the way that Clay was respectful and handled Giana with care. He really falls hard and fast and gets swept away with the pretending.

Miranda was fantastic as Giana. She was youthful, shy at first, slowly coming out of her shell and her performance reflected that perfectly. Edward was another new narrator to me and hello, Mr, Husky. He definitely delivered with his bedroom voice but he gave us an emotional performance too. I also loved that he managed to snort laugh without sounding like a pig. This book is great in audio.

And finally Miss. Steiner gives a nod to romance books in this story, and I loved that Clay did some research by reading her books and paying close attention to highlighted sections so he could love on her how she really wanted. Everyone could learn a lesson from Clay.

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Loved

‘𝐈 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐡𝐞𝐫. 𝐈 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐨 𝐛𝐚𝐝𝐥𝐲 𝐦𝐲 𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐡𝐚𝐝 𝐚 𝐠𝐚𝐩𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐈 𝐰𝐚𝐬𝐧’𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐡𝐞𝐫.‘

OOH WEE! I don’t know who told KS to hit this hard with the sports romance, but I am not mad about it.
This man. I’m adding him straight to my collection of book boyfriends, with zero regrets.

We love a man that takes ownership of his mistakes, and does whatever is necessary for the ones he loves.

And we love a heroine who might not be 100% comfortable in her own skin(we all have an insecurity or two), but who also knows her worth.

This was sweet, this was DIRTY, and it was perfect for my mood.

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